Westward Expansion General
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The “Iron Horse,” the Telegraph, and Westward Expansion The Industrial RevolutionThe railroad also ranked as a vital instrument of western settlement.
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The West--StatesPictures and maps of various important locations in the westward movement.
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The West Resources---PBSContains primary sources like diaries and images.
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American West HistoryHas lots of links and images of the American West. Including Cowboys, Life on a Ranch, Railroad and more.
TrueFlix
Mining
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Mining Industry The Settlement of America: Encyclopedia of Westward Expansion from Jamestown to the Closing of the FrontierThe major driving force that blasted open the West to one of the greatest uncoerced mass migrations in human history was the California gold rush.
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Gold Rushes The Settlement of America: Encyclopedia of Westward Expansion from Jamestown to the Closing of the FrontierA series of international gold rushes, from California in 1848 to Alaska at the end of the century, began the great mining frontiers that transformed the West.
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Mining and Cattle Industries in the West--CCC VideoSegment about mining in the west 4:03 minutes
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Settlement to the West--CCC VideoMining in the West 1:56 minutes
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1848-1865: The Gold Rush EraImages and information about the Gold Rush.
Railroad
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The Transcontinental Railroad Changes the Nation The Transcontinental RailroadOn May 10, 1869, a crowd of almost fifteen hundred people serenaded by a U.S. Army band gathered in the barren desert at Promontory Summit, Utah, to witness completion of the transcontinental railroad.
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Union Pacific Builds West The Transcontinental RailroadNative Americans hated the railroad because they realized it would eventually bring more whites to their ancient home.
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Conquering the West Without Firing a Single Shot; The Northern Pacific Railorad and Those Who Built ItJuly 2, 1864, President Abraham Lincoln signed an act of Congress that created the Northern Pacific.
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Age of the Railroads--CCC VideoBuilding of the railroads in the West. 1:49 minutes
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Charles CrockerCharles Crocker became a titan in California, spearheading construction of the Central Pacific railroad and accumulating ever more wealth and power every decade of his life.
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Research Questions
Chinese
Why did this group move west?
What jobs did they have in the west?
What opportunities did they have in west?
What challenges did they face in the west?
Mexican
Why did this group move west?
What jobs did they have in the west?
What opportunities did they have in west?
What challenges did they face in the west?
Women
Why did this group move west?
What jobs did they have in the west?
What opportunities did they have in west?
What challenges did they face in the west?
Black Americans
Why did this group move west? What was happening in the south that encouraged/forced them to move?
Did the Homestead Act influence/impact Black Americans?
What jobs did they have in the west?
Why was the west a place of opportunity for Black Americans? What would they have in the west that they didn’t have in the south?
What challenges faced Black Americans in the west?
White Settlers
Why did this group move west?
How did the Homestead Act encourage white settlers to move west?
What jobs did they have in the west?
What opportunities did they have in west?
What challenges did they face in the west?
4. Explain the problems that the settlers faced and how they solved them
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Blacks and the West
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Exoduster Migration--ABC ClioDescribes why blacks migrated west.
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Nicodemus Kansas--ABC ClioNicodemus, Kansas, was a town settled by and for African Americans from Kentucky and Tennessee who were seeking a better life in the American West in 1877.
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Image Buffalo SoldiersFrederic Remington sketch of buffalo soldiers around a campfire.
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Exodusters--Encyclopedia of the Great PlainsTens of thousands of African Americans moved into the Great Plains to begin new lives.
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African Americans Encyclopedia of the Great PlainsThere has long been an important African American presence in the Great Plains.
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The Other Pioneers: African-Americans on the Frontier-Junior ScholasticThough they rarely make it to the history books, black men and women helped shape the Old West.
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BLACK REGIMENTS--Encyclopedia of Great PlainsThe term "buffalo soldier, a phrase originally employed by the Plains Indians to denote a black cavalryman, colloquially has come to describe all African Americans who served in the frontier army .
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Buffalo Sodiers UXL Encyclopedia of U.S. HistoryApproximately 20 percent of the U.S. Cavalry involved in the Plains Indian Wars (1866–90) were African American soldiers
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Exodusters--Gale Encyclopedia of U.S. Economic HistoryExodusters were African American homesteaders who moved westward during the last decades of the nineteenth century to settle the Great Plains.
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Black Women in the West--CCC VideoVideo of Black Women in the West 1:04 minutes
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Black Cowboys and the Wild West---CCC VideoBlack Cowboys 2:56 minutes
Chinese
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Chinese Americans ABC-ClioChinese immigrants played a crucial role in the westward expansion of the United States.
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Chinese and Westward ExpansionStarting with the Gold Rush, most Chinese immigrants entered California through the port of San Francisco.
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Chinese Transcontinental Railroad Workers-Development of the Industrial U.S. Reference LibraryIn the mid-nineteenth century, large numbers of Chinese men immigrated to the United States in search of better futures for themselves and the families they left behind.
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Asian Immigration--UXL Encyclopedia of U.S. Historyhe Chinese were the first Asian immigrants to come to the United States in significant numbers..
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Memorial of the Chinese Six Companies Development of the Industrial U.S. Reference LibraryBefore the 1860s there were about forty-one thousand Chinese people in the United States, most of whom had moved to California during the gold rush of 1848 and remained in the state.
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Railroads: The First Big Business Development of the Industrial U.S. Reference LibraryThe construction of the Union Pacific began in Omaha in December 1863 with great fanfare, but enthusiasm died quickly when work slowed due to a lack of laborers.
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Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America TOPIC OVERVIEW Chinese Americans Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural AmericaThe first period, also known as the first wave, began shortly after the Gold Rush in California and ended abruptly with the passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the first race-based immigration law.
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Go West--Chinese CCC VideoChinese in search of fortune.
Women
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WOMEN HOMESTEADERS--Encyclopedia of the Great PlainsThousands of women took advantage of the Homestead Act (1862) that offered free land in the American Great Plains.
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Life and Experiences of a Pioneer Creek Indian Woman: Mrs. Kate Shaw Ahrens (Wagoner, Oklahoma) Voices of the American Indian ExperienceLife and Experiences of a Pioneer Creek Indian Woman: Mrs. Kate Shaw Ahrens
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Food on the Frontier--PBSThe bulk of homesteaders' diets were harvested from their claim or gathered from the wilderness that surrounded them.
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HomesteadersThe Homestead Act of 1862 brought a flood of new settlers to the Plains. Life was hard for the homesteaders. Prairie houses had to be built out of turfs, because there were no trees for timber.
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Mexicans and West
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Battle of Monterrey--ABC ClioThe Battle of Monterrey in northern Mexico on September 21-23, 1846 was Gen. Zachary Taylor's third consecutive victory against the Mexican Army of the North during the Mexican-American War.
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Mexican War Great Events from History: The Nineteenth CenturyThe U.S. annexation of Texas violated what Mexico believed to be its national sovereignty over the territory and simultaneously created a significant border between the United States and Mexico. One year later, war broke out between the two countries, and Mexico was forced to cede half of its territory to the United States.
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GUADALUPE HIDALGO, TREATY OF--Encyclopedia of the Great PlainsSigned on February 2, 1848, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo officially ended the Mexican American War (1846-48).
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Army of the West--The Settlement of America: Encyclopedia of Westward Expansion from Jamestown to the Closing of the FrontierOn May 13, 1846, after being advised two days earlier by President James K. Polk that the Mexican army had violated American territory along the Rio Grande, the U.S. Congress declared war on Mexico, earmarking $10 million and 50,000 army troops for the effort.
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Mexican Cessasion--CCC VideoExpansion of the United States--land from Mexico 3:40 minutes
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THE LONG, HARD ROAD TO EL PASO WITH POLLY RODRIGUEZ --Wild Wild WestThe Texas frontier was first inhabited by Spanish and Mexican families that came to be known as Tejanos, and through the Texas Revolution, the Republic era (1836-45) and into statehood, Tejanos made important contributions to independence and growth.
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Battle of the Alamo--Wild WestAS THE SUN ROSE OVER THE SMOKING RUINS OF the Alamo on the frigid morning of March 6, 1836, it brought light but little warmth, finally revealing the true horror of the ground. For some time Mexican soldados had stumbled through the darkness, shooting at shadows and bayoneting both the dying and the already dead. Many of the Mexican officers were sickened. "The bodies, with their blackened and bloody faces disfigured by the desperate death, their hair and uniforms burning at once, presented a dreadful and truly hellish sight," noted Lieutenant José Enrique de la Peña.
White Settlers
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STARTING FROM SCRATCH--Farmers & RanchersPioneering homesteaders in the American West encountered many difficulties. As manufactured goods were not available, women had to prepare almost all household necessities at home. Children started working almost as soon as they could walk. Homesteaders helped one another by trading and sharing work, tools, and produce. For homesteaders on the Great Plains, scarcity of water was the biggest problem.
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Creating a Home on the Frontier--PBSThe typical log cabin was ten by twenty feet, regardless of the number of inhabitants.
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Western Pioneers--CCC VideoPeople moving west. 2:18 minutes
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A Stocking Full of Frontier AdventureMost men went West during the California Gold Rush either to line their own pockets or to boost their family income. But for some, such as Clark B. Stocking of Michigan, the journey was more a quest for adventure than a quest for gold.
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Mormons Begin Migration to Utah--Great Events from History: The Nineteenth CenturyThe shift of almost the entire membership of the Mormon Church from Illinois to what is now Utah was one of the best-organized migrations in U.S. history. It saved the recently formed church from extinction and transformed the settlement of the West.
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Army of the West--The Settlement of America: Encyclopedia of Westward Expansion from Jamestown to the Closing of the FrontierOn May 13, 1846, after being advised two days earlier by President James K. Polk that the Mexican army had violated American territory along the Rio Grande, the U.S. Congress declared war on Mexico, earmarking $10 million and 50,000 army troops for the effort.
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Mormon Trail The Settlement of America: Encyclopedia of Westward Expansion from Jamestown to the Closing of the FrontierOne of the most organized mass migrations in American history began in 1846 when a group of Mormons left Nauvoo, Illinois, led by Brigham Young, president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They traveled westward over 1,300 miles (2,100 km), through Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, and into Utah, ending their trek in the Great Salt Lake Valley in 1847
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There is No Country Like Crow Country: The Crow Indians and Montana Settlers--PBSAfter nearly three decades of trading with trappers, the Crow entered into their first formal treaty with the United States government in 1825.
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Lonestar Republic--CCC VideoSam Houston wanting to acquire Texas. 3:20 minutes
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Manifest Destiny/Oregon---CCC VideoExpanding to the Pacific 2:05 minutes
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Wild West--CCC VideoWhy people moved West. 58 seconds
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Frontier Editors Were Sometimes In the Midst of Frontier Violence.Not everyone could handle the printed truth--or the printed lies
Being in the newspaper business on the frontier could be rough, and not just because of the long hours and ink stains. Editors sometimes put their lives at risk, and bloodstains were known to crop up now and then when these editors became "the story."
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Mountain MenThe first white people to explore the Rocky Mountains were the trappers. These tough and cunning men spent up to two gears alone in the wilds, hunting beavers and other animals for their valuable fur. These "mountain men" got to know the vast region better than anyone else.
GVRL--Cowboys, Ranchers, Miners
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Gale Virtual Reference Library Referene Book Articles
Pioneer Life in Sacramento
November 25, 1849 --A Miner's Story